Toyota 86: GTS manual accounts for 40 percent of sales

Sales of the Toyota 86 have gone against initial expectations with the highest proportion of buyers opting for a white, manual high-spec 86 GTS.

In Canberra at an event marking the one-year anniversary of Toyota 86‘s local launch, the big T revealed some interesting statistics about the rear-wheel drive sports car. Apart from Australia ranking third highest for global sales, the breakdown of variant sales came as a surprise for the Japanese company.

The high-spec GTS model is outselling the base GT model by a factor of two to one (GTS accounts for 65.5 per cent of sales). This initially caught Toyota Australia off-guard, as the company had predicted a skew towards base model sales given the car’s $29,990 entry price.

“The GTS manual on its own accounts for almost four out of every 10 sales of the 86 sports car while the GTS auto represents more than one-quarter,” executive director of sales and marketing Tony Cramb said.

“There is a $5500 price difference between the two grades, so we’d normally expect something like a 60:40 sales split in favour of the more affordable cars,” he said.

“We soon learnt demand was running in the opposite direction, so we moved quickly to adjust our orders and, in light of the incredible demand, we also managed to secure additional stock from the factory.”

Perhaps the most positive aspect for Toyota Australia has been the influx of new buyers, those that may not have ever considered a Toyota before. More than 80 per cent of Toyota 86 buyers had traded in a non-Toyota vehicle, were first time Toyota buyers or acquired the sports car as a second vehicle.